Nov 22, 2011

Local farmers find demand high in Thanksgiving week

Thanksgiving dinner at the Rosselot household in West Chester Twp. is typical of most turkey-day feasts according to family patriarch, Jim. Come Thursday evening, the dinner table will have a meaty turkey in the center, lots of vegetables surrounding it, and a desert of delicious pumpkin pie to top it off. There is, however, one difference between the Rosselots and many Americans’ dinners.

“We will have grown all of our dinner,” Jim Rosselot said proudly. “It’s a traditional Thanksgiving dinner, but in this day and age, it’s not so traditional.”

Jim and Linda Rosselot are the owners and operators of Gravel Knolls Farms, an 80-acre vegetable and poultry farm in West Chester Twp. The Rosselots also operate a CSA – a vegetable subscription service where subscribers pick up weekly shipments of vegetables based on what crops are currently in season.

According to the National Agriculture Statistics Service, Butler County has 920 farms comprising more than 126,000 acres of farmland. Warren County has 870 farms and uses 88,000 acres of land for farming.

As Thanksgiving approaches, the Rosselots’ winter crops — greens, turnips, swiss chard and other foods — are “flying out of the store.” Middletown Journal

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